GREA T BRIT A IN. 301 



single strong one. The net is lowered into the water to 

 about 2 feet below the surface, and some fine boiled mealy 

 potatoes thrown in, which attract the sprats above it. Then 

 allow it to be quietly drawn up with the fish that are 

 swimming above it, and the shoal does not become 

 alarmed. 



Said not to be taken by a bait, probably due to the small 

 size of its mouth. 



Breeding. I have obtained sprats with developed roe 

 from both the north and south coasts of Cornwall during 

 the months of December and January, but it is not 

 common to find them in this condition. Neither Pennant, 

 Turton, Jenyns, or White advert to the breeding of these 

 fish, but Yarrell states he caught young sprats off Rams- 

 gate, Hastings, and Weymouth in the months of August 

 and September. Lowe ('Fauna of Norfolk/ 1873, p. 29) 

 remarks : " Mr. Dowell says that though he has seen vast 

 quantities of this fish caught, he never yet saw one with 

 roe." Couch observes that uncertainty appears to exist in 

 regard to the season of spawning, which, however, occurs in 

 summer, and probably late in the autumn also. 



Diseases. Mr. Warren (in Thompson's ' Ireland ') ob- 

 serves that " about Christmas, 1 846, vast numbers of sprats 

 died in Cork Harbour, and were carried off in basketsful 

 dying and dead. The people ate them, and considered 

 them very good ; it was the year of the famine. They had 

 mostly a 'pearl/ or white, appearance in the eye while 

 living ; some had both eyes, and others only one of them, 

 diseased." 



One form of parasitic entomostraca, Lerneonema moni- 

 laris, or sprat Lernea, is often found attached to the eye of 

 this fish. The whole head of this parasite is inserted into 

 the tissues of its host, and retained there, due to the barbs 



